Previous to therapy I had no idea Primal Pain even existed, so to encounter it so deeply and so often was a shock to me. Good memories of being a patient and then trainee were the times I could relax with others in a Starbucks coffee shop. We often discussed the fact that we had no idea that we could carry so much pain without being aware of it. The human defence system is very powerful and drives much of humanity’s delusional thinking. Every day of my life I am reminded of primal pain, because it is the cause of mental disorders and humans treating other humans badly, and these things form the stories that dominate newspapers and television programming.

QUALIFICATIONS

Janovian Primal Therapy is not yet recognised by the traditional medical fraternity. Therefore, there are currently no set protocols for becoming a Primal Therapist.

My first area of study was in Natural Therapies, and I completed a three-year Advanced Diploma in Naturopathy. Sometime during those three years I realised Naturopathy was not going to cure my depression and anxiety. However, it taught me a lot about the chemical makeup of the human body and that it needs naturally occurring foods to remain healthy. This knowledge was valuable in my healing journey into the mind, as the body cannot heal, or will not heal, until the necessary nutrients are available. I saw this amongst my fellow patients while in Los Angeles – those who had the most trouble feeling and healing also tended to have the worst diets.

My psychology studies began around 2008, but I stopped to focus on my own Primal journey, and then to write books about how it works and the benefits it can bring to mental health. In 2019 I resumed my studies in psychology and completed the bachelor’s degree in 2025. That gave me two pieces of paper to show how clever I was, but neither of them was able to heal my mental disorders and relationship problems.

That is where Janovian Primal Therapy fills the gap. I spent nearly two years in Los Angeles undergoing extensive therapy while attending a training programme. In my writings I use the three levels of a house as an analogy of how primal works. The penthouse represents the cognitive mind, the living-room and bedrooms below represent the feeling rooms that need to be entered and cleaned out. The basement of the house is where I needed to go to deal with imprinted trauma. Between these three levels is a narrow stairway that I needed to stay on, otherwise I would have gone off-course and that means not reaching the ultimate destination. Because I have travelled this stairway, up and down, many times, I know the way well enough to guide others through the darkness, and back again, gradually allowing them to open into the brightness and fullness of their own lives (read the testimonials).

In the year 2020 there are still no university degrees granted for study into the three levels of the human mind. However, I have now accumulated ten years of experience in conducting the therapy, plus I am still the only Janov trained primal therapist in Australia. That is an important point of difference because Janov discovered and developed the healing pathways in the brain, that I have described previously as a ‘stairway’ through the levels. To my knowledge no other type of therapy can do that, although hundreds of professionals are out there trying. The trauma recovery industry is huge and still growing. My view is that the ‘wheel’ has already been invented – go and see what Janov was accused of being so messianic about.